would take some getting used to.
I sighed as I closed my bedroom door. My pace slowing, I crossed the room to the little table by the window, looking out into the darkness. I could just make out Edgar by the labyrinth made of hedges, opening and closing his garden shears. Even after the day we’d had, he was tending to his duties, helping Ivy House stay beautiful and uncharacteristically weird.
I sat in a chair and allowed the memories to rush over me—plummeting through the air, landing in that spiderweb clearly meant to detain me, falling through said web and nearly splatting against the rocks, and being launched back into the air by Mr. Tom.
I hadn’t thanked Mr. Tom for saving my life. I hadn’t even remembered until this instant. He’d been hurt, under fire, and still he’d thrown me out of harm’s way, if only for a moment. It was his actions that had kept me alive long enough for Damarion and Ivy House to come to the rescue.
My heart swelled. Then guilt ate at me. I’d repaid his heroics by accidentally rousing him before he’d fully healed in stone form. He’d served drinks through the pain, then proceeded to make pizza for everyone because he couldn’t suffer for a paid establishment to do his job. At least Ivy House had helped heal him, but still, I’d been so mesmerized by Damarion that I’d forgotten about poor Mr. Tom. That wasn’t right.
“I’ll do better tomorrow,” I said to the quiet room as my phone chimed.
I pulled it out of my pocket.
A text from Austin: A mage escaped that fight. He’s dead now. I have some information to talk to you about. Can you stop by the bar tomorrow?
Yes, I texted, leaning against the chair back, watching Edgar work. What time?
Niamh’s usual drinking time is fine, he replied.
I nodded, as though he could see me, and noticed the three dots saying he was writing more. Looking out of the window while I waited for him to finish, I flinched a little when Edgar let go of one side of the shears and waved, his claws glinting in the moonlight from the nearly full moon. The light was out, but he’d noticed me anyway, because of course he had. He was a vampire.
Feeling a little stupid, I glanced at the phone. The dots had disappeared, only to flare up again, no text coming through.
Hurry up and spit it out, I texted. I’m tired.
The dots disappeared. The phone rang a moment later, his name coming up.
“Yup?” I said by way of hello.
“Hey.” His deep voice was soft and slightly raspy. “Just wanted to say…credit where credit is due. I covered more ground today than I ever have in my life, but I had enough energy left over to take down a pretty tenacious mage. I have as much strength and endurance as I did in my twenties, but I’m ten times smarter and more experienced. It matters. Knowing when to save energy, when to cut corners, when to go hard—it all matters. It makes me, right now, better than I’ve ever been in my life. It’s like the perfect storm of amazing.”
I laughed, my head lolling against the chair back. “Oh yeah? That good, huh?”
“Better. I never did thank you for making this possible.”
“Probably because you didn’t ask for it, and it came at a price you weren’t comfortable paying.”
“Still. Thank you. That’s all I wanted to say. The explanation was too long for a text.”
I laughed again, grateful for this return to normal before I went to bed. “One got away, huh?”
“Yes. It makes me nervous that the gargoyles didn’t catch him. This guy was mediocre at best, so they should’ve. He wasn’t good enough to entirely disappear.”
“Clearly, since he is now…you know.”
“Dead, yeah. I got some information out of him, but he tried to kill me.”
“He tried to kill you?”
“Of course. I’d captured him, so what else do you think he was going to do? I couldn’t get his boss’s name out of him, though. It leaves us with a blank spot. But given Elliot Graves’s interest in you in the past…”
He let the sentence linger.
Elliot Graves was apparently a big to-do in the magical world, someone like a top crime boss. I was told that he had magic in spades, and given he’d sent a couple of guys to grab me, he was definitely interested. I was pretty sure he was also the mysterious guy who’d shown up outside of